


Pieces Series

by haruun



Series: Tumblr Compilation [2]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, F/M, Gen, Lots of different things, M/M, mostly melancholy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-14
Updated: 2018-10-22
Packaged: 2019-09-21 07:22:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 19,599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17039321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haruun/pseuds/haruun
Summary: Originally on tumblr. Original shorts. Warnings will be posted in the chapter summaries.i discovered that it’s harder to write when im feeling something else. so, i’ve decided to write out my own emotions in short scenarios so that i can get it out of my system, and thus the PIECES SERIES was born without my permission.it’s not going to be regular, nor related to each other, but it’ll just be something i put into words when life or music fails me. it’s going to include haikyuu characters, and even though it’s very personal and nobody asked for them, i’m going to put it here if anyone would like to read some occasional writing. i absolutely will still be working on requests meanwhile.hopefully this will help me with myself while repaying you all for your patience and support.





	1. number one

_“Want to commit double suicide with me?” - Ichigo Doumei_

* * *

The sky was your favourite colour. Even among the collection of concrete houses that lined suburban Miyagi, the bold rusty hue of the sun still painted your horizons like ink spilled over. It looked like your heart bleeding into the heavens.

It hadn’t hit winter yet, just a regular day in late autumn, but the reddish orange was no warmer on your pallor than the brisk air. The only thing heating you up was your own breath steaming in the air, and the  _thunk thunk_  of your own heartbeat under a wool sweater.

Your fingers had started to lose a bit of feeling in them, so you pressed them against your neck to warm them up as best you could.

It was a cold day, and your mind felt even colder.

This was it, you thought. There would be no amount of sky, no piece of music, no broken pieces of poetry that could justify the ache you felt. It was of no surprise to you, only disappointment, and a gentle longing that you couldn’t quite throw away far enough for it to lose its way back.

Of everyone you were acquainted with, you expected Oikawa to show up the least. His approach across the rooftop was as silent as his entry into your life, appearing here and there until one day you realized that you relied on his inconsistency more than you had thought.

He took a seat next to you, cross legged, and placed a gentle hand on top of yours. You let him.

“Say,” you mused, your voice cracking slightly from disuse, “how long should it take for someone to become irreplaceable?”

He didn’t reply for a good while, and all you could hear from him was his steady breathing in and out, and it became your metronome for those silent minutes. You let him tick-tock stability back into your thoughts, too.

“I don’t think anyone’s replaceable,” he finally said.

“Ever?”

“Ever.” He squeezed your hand that had fallen to your side. “Each person you meet is never the same as anyone else.”

It made you love him a little, as a person who was capable of believing such things. Because love is all you can offer in the end, and anything else is transient.

The air tasted a little bitter when you breathed in. “Then why are we so easily replaced?”

“We?” His eyes betrayed your rhetoric.

You laughed. “We. Me. You.”

He turned back to watch the clouds, a small smile on his face. It was a bitter, genuine smile that brought his face to life in the most ruthless of ways.

To tell the truth, it looked quite a bit like yours.

“Because,” he replied, “we’re taught that worth is given to us by others.”

“Just like volleyball.”

Oikawa didn’t reply to that. He probably didn’t need to confirm what was evident. To carve the grooves of his struggles deeper into his body. You agreed in silence, and that was enough.

“So I was given worth,” you told the setting sun, “and when it needed to be somewhere else, they took it away from me and gave it to someone else.”

Oikawa didn’t reply to that either. He only sucked in a breath deeper than the ocean and exhaled with the force of the winds. For the first time that day, you were almost brought to tears from relief that at the very least, he was there for you.

No, that you were allowed to be there for him.

It was when the sun had fully set and the last echoes of indigo and fuchsia in the sky had relented for dark navy that you finally stood up, pulling Oikawa with you. Even the stars held their breath as the two of you watched each other with as much time as there were hours on a clock.

“I didn’t give you anything.” His calm voice felt like the cascade of dried leaves in a strong gust of wind. “You took it. And I can’t take back what’s been stolen, whatever it’s worth.”

“Trust you to make me sound like a criminal,” you laughed.

His eyes burned bright, his lips twitched upwards grimly. He reached out to wipe away a stray tear that had pooled underneath your chin. You tipped forwards to press a kind kiss on his cheek.

Even though your heart still felt numb with the cold, you could see your reflection in his gaze and your eyes burned no lesser than his.

“It’s an equal exchange, I’d say.”

He smiled at that, without care and without burden, and you considered that out of everything that had happened, that, at least, was a win.


	2. number two

_“Let’s go stargazing,” he had told you one evening. There wasn’t much time to reply, because he’d bundled you up in your thick winter coats that you’d always left lying around the apartment, and he’d tossed you into the back seat of his small Mazda.  
_

This car is literally everything you’re not _, you had told him once. Kuroo only laughed and gave you a wink that meant absolutely nothing. You had stared back at him, deadpan, and he had just laughed some more._

_Even though it was a ridiculous decision, and the only thing keeping you company in the back was that massive owl doll that nobody seemed to remember to bring inside each time, you had settled into the snug leather seat. Staring into the almost endless blackness that was your fading town and listening to the white noise of Bokuto and Kuroo bickering in the front seat, you quietly decided that it wasn’t all so bad._

-

“Gahhhhh,” Bokuto made a weird stretching noise beside you on the sand, and faintly, you thought about how all that dirt was going to be on the seats later because Bokuto most certainly was not the type to remember to brush his pants.

“Dude,” Kuroo said from the other side of you, “the sand’s gonna get everywhere later.”

You sniggered quietly.

“I’ll just take ‘em off,” Bokuto replied with supreme indifference, opting instead to look at you. You raised an eyebrow and shrugged. Kuroo made a clicking noise with his tongue, but even in the darkness both you and Bokuto could tell that he was grinning all the same. “It’s not the first time you’ve seen me without pants,” Bokuto winked, and Kuroo started laughing for real.

He turned to you, though, wild hair even wilder that night.

“It’s super dark, why bring a book again?”

You hummed. “Habit,” you said. He was right, it was pitch black with no lights in sight, and the small book you had in your lap, open, was simply a blank slate in the darkness.

Bokuto nodded. “Huh. Gotcha.”

Slowly your eyesight was becoming accustomed to the dimness, and even then, you could see Bokuto’s warm smile, glowing as brightly as hope itself. You thought that the skies were lucky tonight, to be graced with such love for life in one simple expression.

It was cold, and your hands were almost as stiff as a whiskey on the rocks. Quietly, you threaded your fingers through Bokuto’s hand lying on the ground next to you. They were warm, just like his soul, and he squeezed them gently.

Kuroo’s fingers were a little colder, a little longer. He smiled too, and it was brazen, but calmer. When it came to Kuroo, it was all the eyes, you noticed. Everything that you didn’t see on his lips would be shining brightly behind those molten orbs, blinking every few seconds, and if you let your guard down enough, they’d see right through you.

He didn’t need to watch you to read you tonight. His palms were drier than Bokuto’s, and he shifted closer towards you, his shoulder nudging yours affectionately. You could feel the slow heat seeping through the layers of your coats, and your hands tightened, reluctantly, instinctively.

Kuroo quietly chuckled.

“We’re not going anywhere,” he murmured.

Bokuto glanced over then, and his smile split into a wide grin and he pressed a loud, wet kiss against your cheek. You jumped a little at the suddenness of it, both hands too indisposed to wipe off the saliva. Kuroo watched Bokuto shrewdly, but reached over to ruffle his monochrome hair with a soft huff of affection. Sneakily, you leaned in and pressed a kiss of your own on Kuroo’s chin (the only part you could reach with your height), determined not to leave him the only one unscathed. It was only fair, after all.

You leaned back into your own space and shoved Kuroo back into his with a nudge of your shoulder.

“The  _stars_ ,” you huffed.

“You were the most reluctant too,” Kuroo smirked. You ignored his smugness.

“Reluctant to leave the warmth,” you clarified stiffly, “but since we’re two hours away from the house and surrounded by nothing but night and sand, we should maybe do what we came here to do.”

“Oh,” Bokuto piped up curiously, “but we are?” He leaned forwards to glance at Kuroo. “I didn’t know we were here to look at stars. I thought we were just chilling.”

You couldn’t help but grin. “On a beach? In the freezing winter, at 3am?”

“Yeah.”

Kuroo snorted. “You’re the best, Bo.”

Bokuto laughed uproariously. “I totally am!”

“Idiots,” you said, with a smile warming up your face.

-

_You learned that night that it’s not a good idea to fall asleep on a beach in the middle of winter. The crashing waves woke you up, blended into a soft melody of consciousness with the first cold rays of sunlight on the horizon._

_Surrounded by warmth, and heavy bodies curled up into you and each other, you laid there. The sand dug uncomfortably into your back, and it was all strangely moist and rough at the same time. The boys’ breaths formed soft puffs into dawn and you watched them blend with the wisps of cloud against a lightened navy._

_Even if you couldn’t see them anymore, the stars were all up there still. So you kept gazing._

_“And night by night, down into solitude,  
_ _the heavy earth falls far from every star._

_We are all falling. This hand’s falling too-  
_ _all have this falling-sickness none withstands._

_And yet there’s One whose gently-holding hands_  
 **THIS UNIVERSAL FALLING CAN’T FALL THROUGH.** ”   


_-Rainer Maria Rilke._


	3. number three

You think you know what fear is, from all the books you’ve read, all the nightmares you’ve dreamt, all the stories you’ve heard from others. **  
**

“Oh _God_ ,” you’re crying, choking, and with each breath your tears burn you some more, “ _I’m so fucking scared_.”

The warm hands around you don’t comfort you any more than ice could for a wound. They’re cradling your shoulders, holding you in once piece as much as they can, but your breath is still ragged. Your inhales are sharp and your eyes are wide and you feel like time is altogether stopped and moving too quickly at the same time.

You’re crumbling in Akaashi’s hands, like ancient weather-worn bricks, like a temple weathered too many storms and hurricanes. It’s an inevitability, it’s an ending, it something you can’t cry back.

His long fingers are pushing the wisps of hair back from your soaked face, pushing them to fit back with the mess that is your hair.  _You’re_  a mess. You haven’t looked in the mirror in days, preferring to stare in silence at any wall closest to you, or the blank TV. The sofa’s indented with your shape into it after so many hours, a sofa you might not be able to keep.

He murmurs soothing noises against your head, fitted determinedly into the crook of his neck. It’s the only place he can offer you, the only place that’s warm enough to keep you breathing. Even his heart’s not enough- at least, not in the way you’d need. Not in the way you’d lost.

“You’re going to be okay,” he says. It’s not firm, it’s tired, like he’s said this too much for even himself to believe it wholeheartedly.

It might not be okay. ‘Okay’, you’ve come to learn, is so relative that it could be someone telling you that the weather is wonderful today and you realize that they’re talking about a thunderstorm.

Thunderstorms are good. They wash away a lot of things, they release all the weight in the sky. They let you be sad without needing to explain why.

“It feels like it’s never going to be okay,” you whisper. Any louder and you might start crying again.

Akaashi sighs lowly. “Me too.”

You laugh. The cracks in your voice are audible, it’s like someone drawing on a chalkboard with a broken bottle, and you can’t control the pitch. It starts off low, then jumps up to uncomfortably high, and by the end it sounds like you’re sobbing. “If you’re agreeing with me, then I’m fucked.”

“No,” he replies, “it’s if Bokuto agrees with you.”

“Seeing Bokuto upset is going to be the last straw. I’m not doing that.”

It’s Akaashi. It’s always Akaashi. Kuroo’s off on a trip, being happy, and everyone else is equally happy. If it were anyone else you’d be sitting here, being rocked, having them tell you all the ways it’s going to get easier, going to get better, and how they’re going to help you.

It’s all the support you need, and none of the support you want.

Akaashi sits with you. He lets your misery seep into him, like poison, and his heart aches for you each time, and you ache for his. It’s his way of love, his way of caring. You’re both rubbish at worrying about yourselves. Feeding off each other is the way the two of you have adapted. Exposure therapy, one would say.

Or maybe it’s just sad, sad validation.

Being miserable is an addiction. Being sad and crying into someone else’s arms is an addiction. This extraneous fear, this is a dizzying height that you want to jump off of and run away from all at the same time. It’s not the death that scares you, it’s the falling. This falling is making every breath feel like knives. You take another breath, like you don’t want to forget the pain.

“It’s all gone. I’ve lost everything.”

His palm cups the back of your head. “I know.”

“I fucked up. I gave it all away.” You suppress a violent urge to bite on his collarbone until it breaks the skin. “I don’t know how to live any other way.”

“I know,” he repeats.

“I thought I didn’t care,” you’re laughing again, this time firm and loud and abrasive, “can you believe, I thought I was  _better_  than this? Look at me now.  _Look at me now!_ ”

Akaashi pushes you back from him, and a gush of air leaves your chest like it’s the devil gone from your bones. It feels so calm, like drowning, in those deep blue eyes of his. They’re trying to tell you something, judging you, helping you, and the feeling of acquittal reminds you of the ache of a muscle long unused. He’s most certainly looking at you now.

“You want to be better than this?”

You nod. Ashamed. Humiliated. Relieved.

He leans in. His eyes are narrow, and his lips are as sharp as glass.

“Then  _be_  better.”

It’s a long, silent moment. The two of you watch each other, chests barely moving with each careful breath, like a film might shatter if there was any large movement. You finally, slowly, smile. It’s bitter, it’s filled with so much hate for your life, and it’s everything you would never put into words.

“Okay,” you tell him. “Okay.”

Akaashi nods, affirming nothing but your answer.

“Hold my hand.”

You hold his hand. They’re colder than before, and they remind you of vices around your fingers, breaking them like twigs.

He stares at you, and after an age, a soft smile curls at the edge of his eyes.

“Alright,” he breathes. “Let’s try this again.”


	4. number four

_“It looks like the world still wants to tame me” - Sparkle, RADWIMPS_

-

Suga watches the evening sky rain down its glory.

It’s a quiet night, despite the buzz in the news about the meteor shower to come later this night. He’s the only he sees that’s this high up on their rooftops, and it’s a peaceful, chilly evening. He wishes he had brought an extra coat with him, or a warm thermos, to bring back the feeling into his fingers.

Faintly, he wishes that his friends were with him. His friends that burned brighter than the stars themselves at their pinnacle, searing past as they came and went, because Suga has never felt so proud and thankful for the people around him.

Tonight, is for himself. The urge to be surrounded is gone, and the image of Daichi goes last, fading quietly against the backdrop of multi-coloured darkness.

The first one falls, like an angel, like rain, like sin. Suga rests his weight on his palms, and watches. Two, three more fall, and four, five, until it’s a sea of burning rocks in the sky that glow with the force of their speed.

In the sanctity of solitude carefully won, Suga’s own hair glitters with all the life of a comet. The moonlight, unhindered, hits his form and Suga dares to take in a breath to pray.

He prays for the fall of a shooting star, in the next life. He prays for the cumulation of a meteor, in this one. He prays for the achievement of such beauty as one of shimmering hail, in all of them.

If all must pass, then may it be as glorious and eternal as the burn and fade of a comet.

Suga smiles, and thinks that he is lucky to be alive in such a time to see something so beautiful. Sliding his phone out from his back left pocket, he takes a quick video of several meteors flying in the cloudless sky and saves it to his gallery.

He’d ask his team about it tomorrow evening, if they had also watched it, like him.

Quietly, he makes his way down the worn rungs along the side of his concrete home, and gets ready for dinner.


	5. number five

You’re knocked back and forth against the tidal waves of loss and redemption. Your back is bleeding from the harsh scrapes against the ragged concrete behind you- vandalized and long abandoned, this is the only place the authorities don’t look.

This is your home, and it’s empty without you.

It’s mediocre graffiti,  you supposed you wouldn’t mind so much if it were beautiful and multi-coloured, but it’s just filled with cuss words and poorly sprayed slurs against harsh marks where people have spat or carved their initials into. This wall is where you place your mat against, every night.

Sometimes, when you feel like you have the strength, you gaze out into the pedestrian walk from your small corner. You’re careful not to be noticed, only the tip of your head peering past the sharp corner of the underground tube you live in. It’s been awhile since you’ve watched how the other side lives. On the quiet nights without rain or thunder, and when the roaring hum of passing cars has faded, you can sometimes remember the days when you had everything.

Well, not  _everything_. You’ve never had everything. Just more than what you have now.

The sting of memory of lashes against your thighs, the venom dripping from carefully thought out words, the impassive expressions of loved ones walking past. You lived well, ate well. You house was large and beautiful, and your friends all great and magnificent.

You think that in that case, you have more now.

How far have you fallen? You like to think of it as a spectrum, rather than a meter. Even though the air is putrid, the clanging of stray cans and rotten leftovers flung over the edge of the railing into your abode, even though it’s been a week since you’ve had a shower, you can still breathe at night. Your eyes are drier than they have ever been in your years of life, a smile more ready to split your face than it had when you rustled around in satin sheets. Puppies in the park make you laugh, lovers with soft kisses make you smile, and the brilliance of the sunset makes your breath catch.

You’ve only ever used to look down. Now that you’re almost constantly sitting on the floor you’d become so acquainted with, you’ve started to notice the sky.

There’s no way for you to feel full, to feel happiness. But this is better than agony, you think. This dull, throbbing pain that’s the only thing that keeps you company on cold nights. Everyone’s thrown you away, like a phone after use, like a whore after cash has been stuffed in between her soiled breasts. Nobody wants to look at you now, and you’ve nothing left for others to take away anymore. All those people who claimed to love you, whom you grew up with and joked about inappropriate politics with- all gone. Your parents, split up, happy, without each other. Without you.

Your fingers have so much crusted dirt underneath them that they’re almost the colour of the darkening evening. You’re glad, for small graces, like the fact that you’ve never looked up at the pavement to see anyone you know. (Not that they’d look down into a place like this.) You don’t know how you’d react, if they’d ever recognize you, if they ever caught you living a life without them. You still remember their lying faces, their crying faces, until this day. It’s what you dream about when your mind has been exhausted of all pessimism.

You don’t believe in happiness, and you most certainly don’t believe in love. Urine, you think, is still thicker than blood. Water, is even more fickle. Covenant, womb, it’s all the same.

You believe only what you can experience, and for now, exhaustion will do.

* * *

There’s a toe that nudges you, and a hushed whisper that sounds vaguely insistent. It’s been a long time since you’ve woken up to someone, but you’ve been on alert for the police long enough that it’s only a split second until you scramble into wakefulness.

Your eyes are still bleary, splotches of white in your sleep-filled vision, but you recoil and lift a hand up defensively all the same. Two pairs of owlishly focused eyes watch you right back, watching your hand form jerky patterns mid-air as you try to keep yourself steady.

The one with the weird monochrome hair speaks first, his voice a rusty harshness, the sound of a sandstorm.

“You’ve only got that blanket underneath you?”

“Bo-” the other interrupts, his voice a silky, deep contrast, “you can’t just say shit like that, man.”

Owl-hair blinks at you and smiles a little sheepishly. “Sorry.”

It surprises you, how actually apologetic he sounds. The only ‘sorry’s you’ve ever heard are the ones where someone bumps into you on the street before they turn and see your face, or the ones that throw empty cartons onto you by accident when you’re sitting down, and they offer you a muffled apology that sounds like an excuse. Nobody ever apologises to you and mean it. Not even your own family.

You shake your head in slow response, and awkwardly push yourself to your feet. Sparing a quick glance outside at the sky, you note that it’s an unnatural light purple with fades of blue, and the thought that these boys hanging around a park at probably five in the morning might be dangerous.

Yet, instead, the one with the black hair splits into a wide smile. “Want somewhere warm to stay instead?”

“No.”

Time and days have passed beyond your observation, hours and minutes merely blending into the blur that are years and months- the only thing that matters is the number of times the trash collection comes to your park every other morning. Time isn’t necessary for survival, and it’s shown in how your voice cracks and shatters against brittle obsidian.

“Wow,” they both laugh a little, “been a long time since you spoke, huh?”

You stare them down.

“Who the fuck are you? Go hire a whore if you want someone to warm your bed tonight.”

The black haired one grins even wider, and owl-hair leans backwards dramatically and covers his mouth with a hand. “ _Savage_!”

No, you weren’t savage. You were surviving, and one doesn’t simply do that without fending off horny fuckers in the middle of the night. Some of the patrons of this park are usually high, or disgusting, and even though you’re not exactly of the highest caliber yourself, you still have standards. You can’t control what life you’re leading, but you sure as hell can control who gets to piss you off first thing in the morning.

“Don’t talk to the homeless,” you snarl, “living in the city one-o-one. Fuck off.”

The taller, black haired one takes a step forwards and throws an arm in front of his friend. You mimic is step, only backwards, and pressing the curve of your spine into the shape of the dilapidated wall behind you. Your bedframe, you’ve taken to calling it with incredible bitterness.

“We just want to help. No strings attached. We were just passing by and you looked like you needed some life breathed back into you.”

There are a few seconds of silence where it’s a stalemate stare between the three of you, but you break it when you realize you can’t hold your breath for much longer.

“Don’t pick up strays either,” you sigh. It’s a coarse, rough sound that grates against your own nerves. “Don’t do shit you can’t follow up on. Seriously, just leave me alone.”

“No,” the answer comes firm and instant, owl-hair pushes the arm down in front of him and grabs yours in a swift moment. You’re frozen in place- his friend’s frozen too, in mild horror, but all you can see are those devilish, golden eyes that seem more earnest than a young baby’s. “You look like a good person. Y’know, underneath all that gunk. I- we,” he corrects quickly with a glance at his friend, “we just want to help. You. Maybe make a new friend, kinda?”

“With the homeless,” you find yourself repeating, blankly. These kids must be high as fuck.

“No,” the black haired one chimes in, shaking his head with renewed enthusiasm, “with you.”

You raise an eyebrow. “I  _am_  homeless.”

“You don’t act like it,” owl-hair replies. He doesn’t flinch when your arm twitches, or when your eyes widen, or when your lips tighten in affront. “You even sleep kinda differently, with your stuff all neat and tidy and everything.”

Okay, now it’s getting a bit ridiculous and more than a little off topic. You weren’t going to share your sleeping habits with a stranger, no matter how homeless.

“Look, man, dude, whatever,” you snatch your hand out from his grip, “I’m not a pet project. I’ll sleep wherever the hell I want to, so you just hop off home, alright?”

“No!” This time it’s a shout, and it echoes brutally around all three of you in this wasted, filthy tunnel, and your hands fly to your ears in reflex. “Please? You’re not a project, we just-” He stammers, struggles, and you watch him with a distressing mixture of mistrust and curiousity and you know for a fact that you haven’t been shown kindness in so long that it’s starting to make you weak. “-We just like you. You seem okay, and we really want to help you. As a human. No strings attached, we just wanna know your story and everything.”

“Gonna raise me too?”

“If we have to,” those eyes are boring into your very soul, and even when you look away, you’re met with another pair. They’re less brilliant, more sly, but they’re more molten than solid and it feels like you’re drowning and drowning and drowning. “Be our roommate. Just, hang out, help us out with some stuff.”

“Wanna work at a coffee shop?” Black-hair intones smoothly, resting a careful hand on your muddy shoulder. It impresses you slightly, that he doesn’t even glance at the dirt that’s about to come off on his fingers.

There’s nothing to do but laugh. Laugh until your sides hurt, laugh until you’re crying, laugh until you finish laughing and they’re still there, with the same expressions on their faces.

You think that this absolutely has to be a dream- shit like this doesn’t happen to fucking hobos, people don’t just fall from heaven when you’re sleeping to pick you back up into society. This just  _doesn’t happen_.

“You have a deal,” you hear yourself say, and it sounds like the ringing of a funeral toll.

You’re so weak, so very weak, and seeing their excited faces, you know that it’s going to crush you. They’re going to toss you aside when they’re done, when you’ve finally managed to love them in your own, useless little way, because they’re the sort of people you’ve only dreamed about having as friends. More than friends. Soulmates. You don’t deserve them, standing in torn trousers caked in mud and week old leftovers. Your clothes are hanging off your frame of skin and bones, and your hair is so matted against your skull that you can’t even brush your fingers through your fringe.

 _You’re going to end up more shattered than before, when they leave you._ Because everything leaves. Sooner or later, you’re going to be all alone again, in a ditch, wishing for cancer because at least you’ll only need to keep living for three more months.

They wait for you to make a move to gather your things, but you stride ahead of them. There’s nothing by you that you’d want with you, not even the clothes on your very back. Grasping both your hands in each of theirs, the three of you walk through the park, painting an extremely strange picture. Tinted in the purple of dawn and highlighted with the dull expanse of filth, you look like the picture of salvation personified.

“Welcome home,” they tell you with ear splitting grins when you all tumble out of the elevator. Your new home is seventeen stories higher than your padding, framed by your bedroom wall, and the door handle you’re too afraid to touch.

They share a glance that you manage to catch between furious tears, and with two arms, they open it wide for you to take the first step inside.

 _This is how angels fall,_  you think to yourself.  _In the face of glory and kindness, the landing doesn’t even hurt when you fall from the heavens._

You take it. It’s the only thing you know to do- and if you’re going to fall and tumble from your dreams, you’re going to get as high as you possibly can. It’s the view, you see. And you do. Their smiles are like liquid gold, and haggard and utterly shattered by life, you just can’t goddamn help but smile right back. 


	6. number six

_“Not me,_  
It won’t be easy for me;  
Still, you fill up my days.”  
-Fine, TAEYEON.

* * *

“Are you going to leave me too?”

It comes out before you can slam the gates shut, and everything starts to leak through at the smallest chance of sunlight. There’s nothing you’ve ever kept in that wants to stay in- they all want to escape, all want to tear you to pieces just for a gasp of fresh air. To exist, because you’ve never given them a chance to, and this was it.

This is your weakest moment, you at your lowest, and there’s no running from the way your face crumbles and how  _you_ crumble when he turns around to look at you.

He looks bewildered, and you don’t understand why. To you, he has no right to be confused, he’s the one who’s said those things first, and now it’s all his fault that everything clamouring up the ninety degree walls of steel that you’d crafted around your breakdown and he  _looks confused?_

“I… I’m just- I just don’t see what else I can do-” and it’s like you can’t believe your ears.

“You look shocked,” your voice sounds three times emptier than your expression. You can’t really feel it anymore, it’s so numb, but there’s at least a gratifying feeling of not lying anymore, of letting your face crack however the fuck it wants to, to match you inside. No more of those smiles, no more understanding, you’re sick and tired of being the nice one, being the one who has to be logical- you want to break something, you want to break him through breaking you. The thought flits through your mind before you register that this probably isn’t the most loving thing you’ve ever come up with.

_“It’s hard for you, I know.”_

_“I’m sorry I’m putting this on you, how about we try?”_

_“I’ve got some ideas, please will you come back and hear me out first? Please?”_

“Fuck you,” you say instead. “How can you do this to me?”

God, this is nothing like you want to say, nothing you mean, except that it is. Poison tastes like nectar on your lips, and although everything in you is exaggerated right now, it feels so good. It feels so good to break and break and  _break_  until he understands that it’s not okay for you, it’s never been okay for you and that he’s an idiot for having ever believed otherwise. You’re so done with being okay, it’s fucking overrated and you just want to be the minority for once, the ones with their sanity and nothing else. Apparently in this world it’s either one or the other. It shows on his face.

“I’m doing this for you! I’m… look, I’m just not good enough, alright? You said so.”

“I never said anything of the sort.”

“I can see it in your face, stop hiding it. You know I can’t give you what you want all the time, and look, I can’t keep doing this-”

“-I know. I know I fucking suck. So are you walking away because you’re quitting?”

He is. You don’t even need to wait for the answer. Even if he says something else, it’s a yes, it’s such a resounding yes that it keeps ringing in your head and god, you know you’re so full of shit but you’ve been  _trying_. Not everyone’s born a saint, and sometimes you get people like you, devils who don’t want to be. Devils crafted out of someone else’s pressure and hate and this is who you are, alright?

You can’t hold it against him. But you do anyway, because you’re cracking, and this is the only thing that makes you feel better. You can’t run from your instincts forever, even though going the other way might mean that he stays.

He just looks down at the floor, guilt ridden on his face and you’re pissed off because he doesn’t even have the decency to show anger at you, after all that you’ve said to him. You never have before, you know, you were always trying to keep it squished somewhere in a box that you locked behind bars, you tried so hard to be a normal person, but it’s not good enough, ‘He noticed’, you see. And it tastes so bitter how he can notice that and nothing else.

You’re done being anything at all. You’re done being angry, but you’re done being alive. When you’re not alive, you see, there isn’t much that you care about anymore, so you give him the only thing that’ll send him off with the respect he deserves. You take a deep breath.

“I’m shit to handle. I’m hot and I’m cold, and there literally is almost nothing that I can say to you that you don’t already know already. You-” your voice breaks off, because you’re crying and this is the first time you’re not trying to hide it. You look right into his guilt-ridden face as the tears start pouring and your mouth twists unattractively around the sobs that are clawing past your throat. He’s shocked, frightened, and you want to laugh, because what has he to be frightened of? “-I hate it. That you know everything about me that I’ve ever felt and you’re still choosing to walk away. It makes me feel so ugly and hopeless, and I’m still never going to be happy with what I have because that’s the kind of asshole I am.”

You can’t really see anymore past your tears and your eyes are throbbing, but you hope that at least, he feels enough to be crying too. “I’m scared, okay? You’re supposed to be the one who,  _I don’t know_ , is ready for anything and is okay for everything because that’s the kind of person you  _are_ , Daichi. So right now I don’t give a shit about how you think you’re not good enough, or how I make you feel not enough and I’m  _sorry_ for that- I mean, if I was half decent I’d let you walk right away but I’m  _not_ and I  _can’t._  Everyone walked away, Daichi. You’re the only one I gave long enough to stick around and if you leave- if you leave, I-” You think you’re dying because you can’t breathe anymore, no more than you have anything left in you to say and that’s it. That’s all the honesty you’ve got left in you, and anything else you’ve given away to this man who’s chosen to say ‘I’m leaving you’.

This is your endgame, you hope he knows that. He’s Sawamura Fucking Daichi, so he probably does, but everyone’s gone. Literally, everyone has walked themselves out of your life- all the friends you were too depressed to keep, all the family members that thought you weren’t worth it in the end, and all the dreams that you’d cradled to sleep once upon a time- those’ve gone too, along with you being a stable, functioning human being instead of this broken, semi-sociopath who should be taking medicine but isn’t. This man in front of you, the one whom you’ve driven away, is the only person who’s ever given a damn about you, and he’s walking away.

“This isn’t going to happen again for me,” you half-choke, half-laugh at yourself, because it can’t be to him, he’s already heard enough from you, “I’m finished after this.”

“Why don’t you ever believe in yourself?” He asks, and it stabs through you.

“Well that’s what you’re here for.”

He laughs, he fucking  _laughs_ , and it’s one of those sounds that makes your broken little heart swell like it thinks it has a chance to beat again. “I think you’re brave.”

“Do you?” You grin at the ground, and you’re glad you’re not looking up because you might look completely demented. “You’re wrong. I just told you all that shit because you’re leaving. I’m running away again because I’m too fucking tired to give you a salute for your humanitarian work all these years.”

“I know what you’re trying to do,” comes his ever-calm voice, and you want to cover it with sirens.

“Of course, of course,” you mutter. “And why is it that you’re so scared and everything when you’re talking about how you’re not good enough for me, yet now you’re sounding like the Pope?”

“I never said I was brave,” he takes a step forwards, and you take one backwards. “I just hold on for longer than others.”

“Typical athlete.”

“Hey, we had an agreement remember? I don’t diss fanfiction if you don’t diss volleyball.”

“No, no, volleyball’s great,” you roll your eyes at him, but it catches when your brain catches up with your eyes. “I- I guess that agreement doesn’t hold now that we’re not together anymore.”

You feel like ripping off your skin with that pitying look he sends you, because it makes you feel so unworthy. How could you have asked this wonderful person to have wasted his time by your side in the first place, and now you’re begging him to stay with your ‘sweet talk’?

“I’ll stay,” he says to you like it’s nothing. It hurts to hear it.

“No you won’t,” you glare up at him, blinking away your remaining tears because sarcasm is your last defence, “you say that because you’re pitying me, and you’re going to put up with me for a while and then you’re going to want to leave again because I’m a piece of shit.”

“Maybe,” he answers without a second’s hesitation, but he’s standing his ground and you recognize this man again. He’s Daichi, and he’s the most stubborn motherfucker you’ve ever met. “So if I’m going to sacrifice more of my time for you, will you try harder to keep me this time?”

“What-”

“I  _want_ to be with you, believe it or not,” his voice is a quiet murmur, like he’s ashamed, or maybe he’s embarrassed of saying it, and honestly you think that after your soliloquy the bar is set  _real_ low for embarrassment, “but you really hurt me sometimes. And when I see you… crumbling, and I can’t do anything, it makes me feel so helpless… because I can’t do anything to make it better for you.”

“What about you?”

“What do you mean what about me?”

“Do I help you?” You stammer quietly, and your sudden vulnerability stuns you. Daichi doesn’t seem fazed by it, a smile tickling the corner of his lips like he knows what to do now. “All you’ve been talking about is me.”

“Yeah,” he says, and god knows he means it because this is the memory that’s going to keep you going when you’re standing on the edge of something tall, when you’re this close to seeing blood, when you’re about to kick the stool out from underneath you, “when you make me happy, you make me  _fucking happy_.”

That makes you burst out laughing, even though it’s raw and you don’t want it to because it’s embarrassing! Daichi never swears, well, not quite as colourfully as you do, and he just watches you laugh with that lopsided grin of his because that’s one thing that he can offer you that nobody else does. Laughter. Laughter that touches your eyes and breaks both of your hearts in one swift hit.

“I’m dreaming,” you shake your head, and the words sound fuzzy to your ears.

“Then keep dreaming,” Daichi takes the final step forwards to place a hand on the top of your head, and he doesn’t let go when you flinch from it. “I… I’ve got a lot of things to sort out on my end but, I see you like this and I just can’t walk away.” His fingers tighten around a lock of your hair. “If… you’d help me with them, I think we could be okay.”

“Okay.”

“You’ll try then?”

“Yeah,” you say. You’re watching his feet and yours shift around each other, almost touching but never touching. “I’ll try. I’ll try harder. I’m sorry.”

He hugs you, and you fall.


	7. number seven

_“Let it all out, let it all out.  
_ _It seems we’re full of unanswered wants, doesn’t it?  
_ _But that’s great, because they led me to you, after all.”  
_ _\- Let It Out, Miho Fukuhara_

* * *

You don’t remember much, but the hands that held you were warm. You fit into a single palm, and you remember the walls of warmth that you were free to wrap yourself in.

The next earliest memory, was when those hands put you down.

It was cold, wet, and suddenly the walls weren’t warm but chilly. You started wrapping around yourself for warmth instead. You remember waiting for those hands to come back for you, but the walls were high and narrow, and it was hard to remember comfort when it was only. Moisture.

You were just a small thing to begin with. No larger than a regular lizard, and the only saving grace you had was your inner fire that simmered when you slowly became of age.

Before when you would be able to swim around in the waters that never receded, never dried, now your tail hits the opposite end with little effort, and your head is often twisted against your chest in an effort to make more space for yourself.

After a while, you learned to stretch yourself upwards instead of outwards for your snout to breathe in clearer air.

You kept waiting for those hands to come back. There was only ever a small circle directly above you that showed sunlight and all the changing colors of the sky- you instinctively knew it was the sky. What good would your wings be if you didn’t even know what they were born for?

Be that as it may, you had never stretched your wings out before.

You enjoyed spending most of your time guessing the weather patterns. There wasn’t much to do in your difficult confinement, and you delighted particularly when the sun was either searing hot, or when the rain poured and poured. It cooled you down, or made you burn even hotter.

In time, your scales grew thick, and you haven’t needed to feel cold in a long time. The rain was never quite enough in that narrow area of yours to cool you quite right, and the sun only warmed patches of your skin.

Your claws, an invaluable asset for any creature on earth, were only annoyances. They always caught on something whenever you tried to move, and you wished that you could remove them entirely.

So you sat, counted the clouds on azure days, and tapped the tip of your tail against the cold bricks to the beat of your breaths.

The hand would come back, you remembered. It would come back, and here, you would wait.

The first time you ever cried was when you sneezed from some stray ash that had floated down, and you breathed fire. It was a violent, sudden thing, and it melted several bricks together in front of you. You cried because you realized you had become so warm that you could no longer remember the feel of those gentle hands. Whatever was in you, burned too bright for your memories to catch up.

Time was endless, pointless, and your patience was its only measure.

You had wondered if those hands would ever find you, but you hid those thoughts away quickly in shame. They had kept you going on your darkest of days, and they didn’t deserve your doubt.

* * *

Today, you think, is the strangest day you’ve ever had.

There were voices the moment you woke up- perhaps they woke you, you’d never know- and they were odd little things that sounded very melodic. You had always liked melodies, especially in nature. Your head swayed a little to their language.

“Hullo,” and suddenly those voices were very close. You startled, and peered up into the light with your huge irises.

“Hullo,” you say, very carefully.

“That’s a very odd place to be, isn’t it? Can’t be too comfortable down there.”

“It’s alright,” you grow more confused by the second. The sounds are nothing you’ve ever heard before, but each word is clear as a spring brook.

Their sounds are a lot different from your sounds, but they seem to take it in stride too.

“Well, it does look very cool for hot days! Today is a very hot day, I must say!”

“It’s alright.”

“You don’t make much conversation, do you?” The odd creature grins at you with its beak. It’s a short beak, and it has wings too, although they seem much softer and have lovely gradients on them.

“No, I’m afraid not.” You reply woefully. “You’re the first moving things I’ve seen since those hands of mine.”

“Hands?” The creature cackles and wiggles its feathery brows. “Those are nasty human things! You and I have claws! Much better for hunting, in my opinion.”

“Humans?”

“Humans.” The creature nods sagely. “I reckon they’re the ones who put you in that nasty looking hole too.”

You look down at your home a bit shamefully.

“Bokuto, you shouldn’t insult someone’s home, you know.” You look up to find that the creature has a companion: another similar looking creature but with slightly longer feathers and a slimmer beak.

“You’re much darker,” you say, still staring at the newcomer.

“Hm? Compared to Bokuto here? Yes, I must be. There are still fowl darker than I, of course.”

“Fowl?”

“Birds, flying folk. You can fly too, but we’ve got feathers, and you, scales.”

“So you’re… birds?”

The darker one begins to speak, but ‘Bokuto’ caws loudly in laughter. “We’re birds, yeah! You should get out more, my friend, see the world and its sights! We’re owls, me and Akaashi right here. Bigger than the usual variety sadly, we don’t quite fit into trees.”

“We’re older,” Akaashi adds, “old like you are. There aren’t many of us left anymore. Most of the owls out there are smaller and have forgotten how to talk.”

“No better than baubles,” Bokuto comments sadly.

Akaashi nods, and you find yourself nodding along with him. These owls were very friendly, you decide, and you could’ve been far unluckier and met someone nasty for your first encounter.

“Is the outside filled with your owls?”

“I wouldn’t say filled,” Akaashi frowns, “there are a few of us left, but the world is far bigger than we. Us ancient creatures are often in hiding, you see. The great ravens, the sly werecats, the mountain bears and the twilight swans of legend- they’re all out there in their own corner of the world.”

“That’s why we’re so thrilled to have found you!” Bokuto beams. “I haven’t seen a dragon in these parts for a good half of a century!”

“I’m… alone?”

Bokuto looks a little uncomfortable at that, but answers still. “I… suppose, but then again this is human territory, and you don’t find many great beasts here. In the mountains you’ll find your kind, I’m sure of it!”

You fall into a terrible silence. The birds perching on top of your home say nothing, until they hear a small sniff and a tiny burst of flame.

“There, there,” Akaashi’s soothing voice floats down towards you, and it echoes, “you have us now. We shan’t leave you if you’d like us to stay by. You can travel with us for as far as you’d like, until you find a good place for a lair of your own.”

“This  _is_  my lair,” you sniff. “I grew up here.”

“A well?” Bokuto sounds bewildered at the very idea. “A well’s no place for a dragon like you! Your majesty is utterly lost if you don’t get to spread your wings and raze forests!”

“Let’s not try and encourage environmental destruction, Bokuto.” Akaashi sighs, and Bokuto slaps a wing over his beak. “He’s right, though. You’re born into greatness, into myth and legend. You must’ve found your way into a well by accident when you were a new hatchling.”

“Odd,” Bokuto agrees behind his wing, “all the dragons I know guard their eggs like the gates to the afterlife.”

“You’ll understand when you have your own nest, Bokuto.”

“Bah. I don’t fancy the idea of staying in any one area. Traveling with you is just fine with me.”

You didn’t know that you came from an egg. You didn’t know that you could be guarded, even- the only memory was of you being cradled, and even then you were open and free to the harsh mistress of winter. The only protection you know is in this ‘well’ of yours. Leaving sounds inconceivable.

“I’m afraid I can’t join you,” you murmur, “I’m waiting for a pair of hands, you see.”

“Hands? That’s even more odd! Will any do? I reckon I can pluck a pair for you somewhere.”

“ _Bokuto_. That’s harassment.”

“I know, I know. Waste not, and all that. I’ll bring the whole human, how about that? Are you terribly hungry?”

“I’ve never eaten before. I drink a lot.”

“Stale, well-water! Come with me and I’ll show you all the best spots for water fresh from a glacier.”

“Those hands,” Akaashi interrupts very gently, “what’s so special about them? Have you been waiting here all your life?”

You nod. “They’re the ones that put me here. They were very warm, and I’ve always thought they’d come back for me, so I’ve been waiting.”

“Do you know why they put you here?”

You shake your head.

“How about whose hands they were?”

You shake your head again, and suddenly a sad countenance sweeps over Akaashi’s feathery face.

“I’ve heard of this happening before, if I remember correctly.”

“What happened? What happened?” Bokuto flutters his wings impatiently.

“Back when there were more dragons around, it was very popular for human villages to drive expeditions into the mountains to search for those golden eggs. Of course, they weren’t golden, and only reflected the gold from the flames they are bathed in upon birth. So they started farming for hatchlings, instead. Dragon scales are the hardest material in existence, and they made very good armour. Humans liked to harvest those, and soon, they smuggled a lot of dragon eggs here and there.”

You perhaps must be a babe newly hatched, and something must have happened to the smuggler. A well is a very odd place to put a dragon indeed, and I think they must have met some trouble and planned to pick you up from here once it was over to continue on their journey. They must not have made it, then, if you’re still here to this day.”

“If there were humans around this area, then it must have been quite some time ago.” Bokuto says.

“Close to a century, perhaps. My memory isn’t as clear as it used to be. Now the only humans here farm for crops in the ground, and none approach dragons anymore, not after the great fire sixty years ago.”

“What fire?” You ask, very tiredly.

“One of the greatest dragons, thankfully still alive today, had his hatchling stolen. In his fury, he went on a rampage and razed an entire human settlement down. Humans have stopped stealing from the great wyrms since.”

Akaashi finishes his story, and a tired heaviness blankets your thoughts. Those hands that you had been so terrified to forget- they had long perished. The warmth that you had felt had never been kindness, but greed, and perhaps it has been so long that your blood kin would have forgotten you, and moved on.

For the first time in your life, you begin to feel hatred for this well.

To think that you had once wanted to stay here forever, to tear our your claws for this very place! Your tail begins to twitch out of control, smacking into the confined space that you have, and the well rumbles several times from your efforts.

“It is not too late,” Akaashi’s voice of reason sounds again, and your trembling stops if but for a while. “Many of us have terrible stories, origins we choose to forget over time, but you must not let your anger overcome you.”

“Right,” Bokuto nods, “you’re young! There is no time that cannot be made up for with freedom, with exploration! You have much to learn about the outside, and you can find a new pair of hands- I daresay maybe even a pair of claws- that hold even greater meaning!”

“Don’t give up,” Akaashi tells you kindly, “it is but two steps for you until your prison is no more.”

Your heat rises to your throat, and you keep it there with effort. Your large eyes blink and flicker up to see the brilliant figures of your two new friends, who have taught you more about yourself than you would ever know through mere existence.

Bokuto grins again. “Never forget, you’re a  _dragon_ , my friend. The oldest, greatest beasts to have ever been born into this glorious world, and nothing- not even the strongest well in the world- can hold you back from being all that you were born to be.”

Akaashi smiles at his companion fondly, and Bokuto’s chest puffs up in pride at both his speech, and at your majesty. Your muted majesty that you have never considered, and you wonder if you can really call yourself a dragon if you have never even stretched your wings.

Oh, the  _sky_ , that expanse which has always sung to you in your nightmares, tugged at your very heart on nights unending. You look at Bokuto and Akaashi’s elegant wings, and suddenly you are overwhelmed by a great urge to soar into the timeless skies.

Not quite yet, not with you still stuck in a space far too small for you, and a stray tear leaks from your eyes. It steams on the coolness of your scales, and Akaashi smiles fondly at you too.

“You shan’t get lost with us guiding you. Would you like to come up and join Bokuto and I?”

This is the bravest you think you will ever be, and courage fuels your desire to be. To live.

“Yes, please.”

“Then push!”

With a great cry, Akaashi and Bokuto spread their wings that easily eclipse your window to the outside world and lift themselves off the ground. So beautiful, so effortless are their movements that you forget for a moment what you were about to do.

Their massive figures float in shadows above your groove in the ground, and you know that even if you were to die tomorrow, you would find a way to join them where you will never have to curl up around yourself for room again.

Your claws dig into the brick like steel on chalk. Step by step, you push yourself up from the bottom and closer, closer to where the edge meets the world. You stumble twice, but your great tail slaps the base and you are propelled upwards once again.

With the first breath you take, you  _roar_.

You roar for the life you have yet to live, and the trees around you shake. The dry dirt balloons up in awe and you place one great paw on the land in front of you. There is a thunderous crack, and the side of the well underneath your feet begins to crumble.

Wordlessly, you watch as your home collapses onto itself, and you have nowhere to return to.

“Spread your wings!” You hear Bokuto call from his place in the sky, “flap them and come join us!”

You spread your wings. Leathery and heavy, they tug at your joints in unfamiliar ways. You give them an experimental flap, and you almost yelp in surprise when you lift yourself off the ground.

“Again!” Bokuto yells, “again! Keep doing it!”

Again you flap, once, twice, three times until the burn begins to grow familiar and your unused muscle springs into life. Soon the trees are far underneath you, and the only sound you can hear for miles is the slow beating of your wings intertwined with the gentle flapping of your friends above you.

Akaashi glides down to meet you. You look at him with undisguised terror, and he laughs.

“You must be the first dragon to be afraid of heights,” he teases, and you blush. “But I can see that you love the sky. You will get used to it very soon, but first we must hurry. Dusk is almost upon us, and we should get to a safe place before the sun sets.”

Bokuto does several dives and swoops around you as you slowly flap your way forwards.

“Feels good, eh?” You nod enthusiastically. “Wait ‘till I teach you all the cool moves!”

“Before that,” comes Akaashi’s dry tone, “you should learn how to glide. Flap your wings when you need to gain speed or height, but it is a much easier experience for you to glide when you want to maintain your velocity. Try.”

The relentless thrumming of air halts immediately when your wings still in their positions. Suddenly you can hear the birds, the howl of wind through the forests and the emptiness that is the planes of sky and clouds.

You glide past a low reaching cloud, and recall how you counted them in your well.

It is impossible to stop the tears, and with your limbs tucked safely against your body, there is no method for you to wipe them away. The sniffles are a lot quieter in the air, but the owls hear them anyway.

They say nothing and keep their vigilance at your side.

Akaashi smiles, and so does Bokuto, and when the tears finally stop and the sniffles end, your smile stretches the widest of all.


	8. number eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _An experiment with words._

Although flowers simply  _are_ , in their waxing and waning, the language of florals must be the most elegant manner of communication yet.

If you had the eyes of a purveyor, and the mind of the fae, the stories of flowers in this little dip in the road would have etched their histories out bare along the cream cracks on the wall. Maps, timelines, poetry in half-haikus all ready to be sung at a moment’s notice, and the  _multicolor_  lives that span across canvases. Anywhere is an origin, every vine a year, and the great roots of existence curl themselves in majestic ceramic pots at the base of the flowers of the world.

It’s a maze, like every flower shop should be, a collection of walls here and there planted by a deity doomed to fall in love with the pattern of petals for the rest of its eternity. Some flowers are, and some flowers aren’t. Like any man’s life, it swirls and dips and jumps across leagues, and where its stem begins it green against one wall, the petals and stigma flourish on another.

A witch’s curse, a steaming teacup, a rainbow’s death.

And what are seasons, but the passing of time? Walk along the walls for long enough, and any man will experience them all- the chill of a brisk wind, the love of a dying hearth, and the fingers trailing along the lost lines of flowers guide men to places where it snows in summer, where it scorches in autumn.

The only flowers for sale are the ones that allow themselves to be picked. When they fall from their perch, ripe with the heavy years passing, and ready to begin another story when another’s hand wraps around their stem and brings them to another home.

One’s life is another’s art. One’s art is another’s life. And a flower’s life can only be art, pressed between pages, plucked for vases, gifted against someone’s crown.

Close your eyes, and stay very still. Your life and your visage may be eclipsed with a single word, and you will reshape yourself to fit it. Which shall you be, in your silent, unmovable beauty?  _Forgiveness; passion; longing; grief; expectation._

A customer parts the cracks in-between the double doors, and you become a part of someone’s message. Someone’s intentions they have no words for, and the task of echoing a man’s desire falls to you. Your immeasurable wholeness, incomplete and complete. A petal may fall, you may brown, but as with all affectation.

Permanence is not what makes a flower beautiful.

Man comes in for the first time. Perusing the walls, the floors, the ceiling, and an ageless spring overcomes him. He lets his breath trail behind him and his fingers in front, caressing fronds and brick alike. The maze takes however long he needs it to, and he reaches the ending having forgotten the sound of his own footsteps.

Someone awaits him at the summit. Winter has swept in like the tide, and man shakes once, twice, in his man-made suit. Someone stretches out a hand to him, underneath his nose and beyond the next crescent.

When man takes it, he lives all the seasons at once.

“Daichi,” man confesses. He does not hear himself speak, but feels it as his tongue undulates.

Someone smiles, and pulls man up a step. A step closer.

“Suga,” someone says, “and welcome to my flower shop. How may I help you today?”


	9. intermission

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _A rambling prose piece without any fandom characters. I just really needed to get this out of my system. Give it a read if it interests you, but it’s more of a prose essay about things. No story, no characters. This is just here for pure sharing, and to give some help or solidarity for those who might stumble across it and find themselves needing it. Also unedited._

Are you the type of person who thrives on praise, or criticism? 

If someone says to your face, finger aimed at the empty space between your eyes, that you’re a failure, that you’ve disappointed them–that you’ve wasted their life, are you the type to bite it back? The edge of a verbal longsword that steams as it cuts through bone and nerves whilst cauterizing the trail of wounds to prepare you for the next round; you let it carve through you what’s left of your mind and when it’s all over and done, all that’s left is a husk of who you used to be. When the person walks away, taking everything they can with them, you choose to fill it with spite, vengeance, pure, dripping anger and a bitterness that fuels what remains of your days. You succeed, and hearing the silence where there once were knives is enough to bring you peace.

Or perhaps you’re the person who withers when they’re stretched above fire like a suckling pig. Your soul is frail, it’s broken, and the yearning outweighs the fury, and when someone offers you a hand, you feel it everywhere else it hasn’t yet touched. A kind word gifts you the chance to blossom; the absence of someone’s cruelty is enough space for you to bloom into who you believe you were meant to be–all that you know you can be. A pet’s lick on your face, a soft whisper of encouragement, someone’s slow, reluctant smile as you show them the fruits of your labour. You know it doesn’t have to be much, but when there isn’t enough to slow you down, you rise, and rise, and rise.

Or, if you’re like me, you might not know how to choose. Or perhaps there has never been a choice for you–you prefer one, you’re  _born_  for one, and yet all you’re proffered is the alternative that sends you drowning. There are times where you steel yourself and hiss,  _“If someone else can do it, so can I.”_ But in all truthfulness, you know that all you can do try and try and try. The corners begin to wear down, cracks are mended and re-mended, but when the pedestrians cross they begin to split underneath the pressure. There isn’t enough sunlight, even if you’d pretended you were a moon flower, and you end up a little stunted. If you’re lucky, you don’t have to battle with others for height, just to take a breath without gasping.

You wish there were more directions for you to choose from. Push away the wild weeds and hack at the vines to create your own way, but five steps in there’s a cliff staring you in the face.  _I dare you_ , it beckons, and the wind laughs where the hollows lie watching.

If, like me, you are the type of person whose roads crumble behind them no matter which direction they walk in, then you’re in a bit of a pickle. Your shoes are worn, and somewhere in the back of your mind you remember the days before that person came and gathered all your things and vacated the premises; you used to be able to turn around, and pull out a new pair from storage. Now, the roads are wild, and your soles are blistered, and a pitfalls comes crawling closer and closer; all the while the wind laughs, the cliff beckons, and the hollows watch.

Now, there are yet two final options before you. You can either close your eyes, and leap, or you can squint ahead to make out the edge of the horizon, and venture a step forwards into the two hundred feet drop.

I lied. There’s a third question to be asked.

_Does it matter which you choose?_

They started teaching it at school and hospitals and makeshift classrooms tucked underneath warm blankets with your parent figure looming over you at bedtime. The simpler days, when they could afford simple explanations. ‘Uncle died’, they’d say to you quietly, almost as if they were terrified that death would hear its name and come after them next. You never knew what it meant, but you’d nod and accept, because your parents looked terribly down and it must be a bad thing. When you get older people stop looking miserable, but then they start to say things like ‘unfortunately’ or ‘tragedy’ or ‘i’m so sorry’. So, it’s a bad thing, you figure. The evolutionary impulse to survive nods along with you.

But the first time you learn something new is when you peer closer. It’s dangerous, you could fall at any moment and maybe people will notice you leaning over to get a closer look and lock you in the loony bin, but there’s always a risk to things that are good for you. They don’t like it when you find treasure easy, you see. Not when they’ve given up long ago.

Have you ever stood at the edge of something high, or hesitated in the moments before doing something completely reckless, or the burn in your throat when you’re finally saying something that you’ve been aching to say, to hell with the consequences?

The part of death that they don’t let you discover, that they keep it locked away in a safe that gathers dust across the centuries, is that it has a shadow. A soft, quiet thing that follows it around, tracing it footsteps and occasionally daring to peek out. But when it spreads its wings, slightly mangled but functional and  _massive_ , it’s a symphony. It’s very light in colour, and rather inconspicuous, so you have to squint very, very hard.

Its name is Freedom, and I think that it cheers up indefinitely when someone finally catches sight of it, and it spreads its wings in greeting.

Death is the ultimate end. When everything you are and everything you know starts to fade away and you’re so wordlessly terrified of what comes next–you’re not ready to stop being here, to stop  _being_ , but it’s okay. There’s someone on its other side that’s happy to see you, ready to catch your drifting soul. Where death comes, freedom reaches out its hands.

Death is also the ultimate beginning. You could cease to exist, or you could go to hell, or you could be reincarnated as someone possibly even more wretched. You could also start flying. You could float, soar, become an eagle, or the Lord of all eagles. You could be reborn as someone better, someone kinder, someone softer, or maybe you can join the stream of life that hovers in the dimension next door. Or, a personal favourite of mine, you could be changed into something large, impossibly giant like a planet, and you would swim through nebulae and  lost stars with your kind.

The loophole that people have forgotten, is that you don’t have to leap into death’s arms to discover all this. It lies quietly underneath the rug, waiting for you to stare long enough, peer closely enough, to notice that something’s different–something there that perhaps you had missed before.

You can stand on the edge of the cliff, your mangled feet curling over the edges and feeling the unforgiving stone dig into your toes. You can lean forwards, or crouch, or adjust your eyeglasses, and watch for death’s figure approaching, for behind him will be a shy little shadow, afraid of the sticks that people have hit it with to banish it away.

It’ll be overjoyed if you notice it. Not many people do, and death will look behind it and laugh, because it’s always felt rather sorry for its beloved friend. After the wings, after the greeting, maybe there will be a glint in your eye, a sort of reckless abandon that rushes through you that makes you almost want to jump–because why not? You can take the arm that death offers you to keep you steady, and it’ll ask which path you want to take.

The crumbling ground behind you grows louder as it comes nearer, and the right and left of praise and criticism spread out their hands in a laissez-faire gesture of half-hearted welcome. You can look at Freedom, a beautiful smile on its face after making a new friend out of you, and it’ll point with a small finger at the expanse between you, and the bottom of the beckoning cliff.

“If you have faith,” it’ll whisper to you through the winds, “you can walk where there is none, and see for yourself if there is a path yet.”

I’d like to think that I would. It’s two hundred feet below you where even death is afraid to follow, a seductive call of broken spines and broken souls where they lie still and at permanent rest from ever needing to suffer paths again. You take a step where Freedom’s fingers had pointed you and with a massive breath held and trembling in your lungs, you walk your first time on infinity.


	10. number nine

**_STAY WITH ME, ON WINTER’S EVE._ **

* * *

On a rare clear night such as this, the billboards and neon lights glittered even brighter around Piccadilly circus. The massive snow cloud haunting the city the past few weeks had worn itself out, and the near blizzard had abated into an unusual but not unwelcome emptiness, with only a few brisk gusts to usher people on with their evenings. Tonight, of all nights, was Christmas Eve, and most people were being very much ushered into their shamefully last-minute Christmas shopping. Everyone seemed to be scurrying somewhere with exasperation plastered all over, and no fewer than eight people had swung their hulking great bags into your shins in the time it took for you to cross a few streets to the pub.

There weren’t any customers loitering outside the wooden doors this evening, even if there had been a steady stream of people heading in all sort of directions along the pavements nearby. It was left free for you to shove your shoulder against the handle instead of having to pull your hands out of your warmed pockets.

You looked up when the small welcome bell hooked above the doorway didn’t ring, missing all the daggers shot your way for letting in the frigid air.

“Close the bloody door,” someone hollered from the back, and there was a laugh, and the barkeep’s familiar voice cut in before anyone could start cussing.

He pointed at the brass bell above your head. “It froze over sometime last night.” Wisely, you let the door fall shut behind you to avoid being mobbed. “Haven’t had the time to sort it out yet, but we’ve all got eyes, don’t we? Don’t need a blooming chime to see a grown man walk though those creaky doors.”

“Oh yes,” agreed someone else, slow and drawling and doing a terrible impression of being serious. “I think we can all attest to your eyes being abnormally functional.”

The barkeep rolled his eyes and continued wiping down the beer nozzle. “You’re welcome to hop over the counter and keep this business afloat with new folk coming in here trying to scurry out before paying their tabs.”

“You’d think it’d be better in Central London,” added another, over the rim of a wooden mug so huge it was almost a tankard. You slipped past a few seats to catch sight of Daichi with what looked like a miniature barrel of mulled wine tucked in-between his hands (it was always mulled wine in winter; he hated beer and tried his best to avoid downing apple cider in front of such disreputable company), nodding along to the barkeep’s next complaint and flashing you a warm grin. Sat next to him was Ushijima, body loose and draped over the bar table almost casually and five different sized glasses, all empty, were strewn about him. It was Kuroo’s doing, of course, who was sprawled like a resplendent ghost of Christmas to come, watching Ushijima’s development rather smugly.

Daichi gestured at the empty stool between him and Kuroo. There was a cup of something frothed perched on top of it to keep it warm for your bum and a thick plaid blanket sat happily next to it, messily folded and all ready to be shaken out by a shivering customer. When you stood there motionless for a little too long, Kuroo tapped the stool with the toe of his boot and gave you a long look.

“Come on, it’s cold by the door. Daichi even got you a drink.”

Someone’s bag caught you by the ankles again as you headed towards your seat obediently. Calmly, Daichi set the drink on the table in front of you whilst you unfurled the blanket and huddled underneath it. Sneaking your hands out of your mittens and around the steaming mug, you took a massive gulp, ignoring the burn of heat down your throat. Ushijima made a small sound of surprise from a seat over and before you could burn your mouth to death, he leaned over the table and gently pried the cup out of your grasp, and to your right, you heard a quiet sigh.

The three of them were quiet for a moment, sipping their drinks and attempting to watch you without you catching on as the hum of muffled chatter in the background filled in the empty spaces. Even the barkeep was unexpectedly polishing his wares in silence, but not before he slid a platter of freshly baked scones over to your small party on one of his ghastly vintage plates.

“Thanks,” you managed from underneath your scarf, and he nodded.

It was almost ceremonial, how the three of them would be here on Christmas Eve. As the collective backbone, founders and continual authority of Thursday bar nights, it was fitting that they would be here in your group’s favourite pub with your favourite owner, underneath holly wreaths, flashing tinsel and drunken carols to herald in a new Christian year. Not that anybody gave a second shite about baby Jesus or the three wise men, but it was undeniably the best holiday of the year and such communal goodwill and cheer was not to be left unexploited by a few blokes who really liked drinking in crowded places.

There were occasionally more people in attendance, but that varied with each Christmas. However, these three were here unfailingly year after year and every year like so, you would sit in the chair sandwiched between them as they pressed in closer with their pointy elbows and loud laughter.

Slowly, you would put out of your mind the question of what comes next, after the glow of giving slowly evaporated from the masses and London once again returned to its dreary politeness and the ungenerous atmosphere of rush-hour traffic.

“Harrod’s is green this year,” Kuroo said. “It’s a bloody good change from red all damned season, I say.”

“It’s green because it’s Christmas,” Ushijima pointed out. “It’s quite literally the only other option.”

“Is that so? What about the North Star, or the national colours of Jerusalem? Couldn’t have someone done something with those colours? You’d think Father Christmas would be sick to death from seeing green and red for fucking millennia.”

“If anyone would know,” Daichi said with a wry smile, “I think it’d be you. How  _is_ Father Christmas this year, by the way? Feeling the full weight of those presents and adult responsibility on his broad, aching shoulders yet?”

That pulled a snort of laughter out from you, imagining Bokuto in his annual role as Father Christmas at home for his army of nephews, nieces, and an infinitely extending family. Akaashi would be there, of course, bearing all his antics as gracefully as possible, but anyone who knew him well would easily spy the tell-tale flush on his cheeks and the way his lips would be twitching upwards, his eyes soft and curved. And, through all of that, Bokuto would probably be attempting to scale their long defunct chimney, closed due to modern fire hazard reasons, trying not to snap his neck into an early grave.

Kuroo sniggered. “His third cousin’s given birth to twins, and they’re not gonna let him off the hook any earlier than two in the morning.”

“God forbid he takes off the costume,” you murmured, “I don’t think any of the kids in his family are old enough for the crushing reality of ‘guess who really pays for those presents, and it’s not a happy fat man’.”

“Hah, that’d be a sight for sore eyes. Can you imagine? Reindeer? In London? Do you know how many residents are going to file complaints for deer shit on their rooftops after Boxing Day?”

Ushijima sighed emphatically. “You’d think that grown men and women would be able to climb up their very low houses and pick up a few lumps with a plastic bag. No reasonable person should ever see shit on their roofs and think, ‘I know who I’d nominate for the job: The Chief of Police.’”

You took another draught of your drink. It was a latte—which pubs definitely didn’t sell—meaning the barkeep must’ve gone upstairs to his flat for his coffee machine especially. Belatedly, you noticed that it had already half disappeared. Along with quite a bit of your sense of taste, thanks to its temperature.

“Ushijima, you’ve just described the entire country’s current pet climate.”

“It’s quite a bother sometimes when they poop right after you’ve run out of bags or paper.” Daichi sighed heavily, the echoes of personal trauma ringing after it. His dog, although very large and very lovely, was also infuriatingly picky about his excretion. Many people—all strangers—have yelled. “But at the very least I can say that I’ve never called the police for it.”

“Pet owners don’t call the police,” said Kuroo bitterly, also a regular attendee of Traumatic Pets Anonymous, “they have the police called on them by heartless, petty neighbours.”

You frowned. “Your cat tore up someone’s sofa.”

“You’d want me arrested because of some claw marks?” Kuroo asked, affronted.

“They’d probably be there to prevent her from murdering you in the kitchen,” Ushijima muttered, and Daichi burst out laughing. “It’s  _Italian leather_ ,” you protested, and they chimed in halfway with what they had heard a thousand times before.

Oh, someone was bound to say something about your sofa next, and if only you had someone to bet against, you’d double your entire fortune on that person being Kuroo and his charitable comments.

“I’ve  _never understood_  why there’s this queen of bloody furniture sitting in the middle of your living room when your mattress is still second-hand IKEA,” said Kuroo. “I mean, we’re all adults here so fuck it—are you or are you not afraid of cum stains? Don’t—” he quickly cut you off when you opened your mouth for a poor explanation, “—don’t deny it. They are there. They are  _always_  there. You think university students don’t fuck any chance they get, their own fists not excluded? You have a job, woman, stop collecting hand-knitted throws and start saving towards a new Sealy’s.”

You were cut off again by a very amused looking Daichi on his second tankard of wine. You had to agree that they really did look very authentic, and if you didn’t know better about the high rent prices, you’d think there was a storage room in the back just full of little historic mugs being aged properly in the dark, dank cold.

“I reckon it might have to do with how much one of those things cost, Kuroo. You could afford a new car with just three of those, four if you’ve a big family. Besides, we’re still young enough to endure a few more years of poor spinal support, don’t you think? And stains aren’t something that a new bedsheet can’t solve.”

Kuro leant in closer to you, and you caught a whiff of the rich liqueur of hot eggnog on his breath.

“I am offended on your behalf.”

His eyes were narrow and focused, the heat of questions you knew he wouldn’t dare ask in the middle of a pub thinned his lips and you were barely aware that time had suddenly slowed, and your breath building up in your lungs.

It could have been after the rest of the evening or an entire month, you weren’t sure, when Kuroo finally leant away from you again, resting on his elbow and an inscrutable expression dancing along his brows. You turned back with a faint breath to your drink, now slightly cooled from neglect, and found Ushijima watching you as intently as was politely possible. Daichi was clearly  _not looking_ , instead interviewing the barkeep about something related to cider and buckets.

A thick lump swelled in your throat, clogging your voice and suffocating it underneath its sour sting, and something else had been birthed in your gut, writhing, furious and slowly wrapping itself around your insides, throttling the feeling out of your lungs and creeping up your trembling hands. But all you could see was your splotchy reflection in your mug, pale, still and your cracked lips frozen into a thin, straight line that did no favours for your dull eyes.

You tried to smile, to break into a laugh to brush the atmosphere away, but you were met with only a grimace in your cup.

There was suddenly a squeeze around your arm and all too easily with a heartbeat so slow you might as well be catatonic, you turned to look. Kuroo watched you, his hand wrapped around your bicep firmly but softly, and his arm twitched, like he couldn’t decide between shoving or pulling.

And because you couldn’t, you shouldn’t, and you most certainly didn’t deserve to, you looked into his worried eyes and permitted yourself to feel absolutely nothing. Someone could have slapped you across the face and you’d have stared back at them with your parched, stern stare.

“I’m fine,” you said, even though nobody had asked.

The hand tightened a fraction, but Kuroo finally looked away and dropped his hand. “I’m fine,” you repeated, this time with more feeling, and he nodded once, unable to meet your eyes. You could see the line tense in his jaw as he clenched it, and barely, just barely, did you tamper the urge to say something completely inane because you’d more or less come to ruin someone’s evening. It made it no easier to know better than most that Kuroo deserved a festive night without the pressure of your charming presence.

You wondered what had happened to the mindless chatter a few minutes ago. Your stupid leather sofa had seemed so important then, and the mentions of friends in warmer places—it was almost as if nothing really mattered as long as everyone was appearing to have a good time, even if they were in the middle of London with a bunch of drunkards instead of setting up their Christmas trees with their parents.

The dull throbbing in your head in part wished Daichi would stop talking to the barkeep, and that Ushijima would stop staring at you as if he could flip through all the pages in your book if he wanted to.

But that would be ungrateful, and you needed to be anything but that if you were to make it through the rest of the night.

“Are you all going home tomorrow?” You asked, swallowing the last vestiges of your coffee, and faster than you could blink, the barkeep set down something else in front of you. You did your best to offer him a reassuring smile when he only seemed to frown even deeper. The drink looked as brown as the rest of the pub in the dim lighting, and it took you a sip to identify it as a glass of hot buttered rum before adding, “I assume everyone’s here because they’ve done all their obligatory shopping.”

Ushijima gave you an odd look, but when he opened his mouth Daichi cleared his throat and shook his head ever so slightly. Looking no less troubled, Ushijima fell back into his seat in silence.

“You know I’ve done all of mine last month,” said Daichi. “Stores start selling Christmas things in late October, and they almost always hike up the prices mid-December.”

“To punish the slothful, I know, I know.” You huffed. “Always the saint.”

Daichi laughed and winked at you. “It’s the secret to affording decent mattresses, my dear. You’ve got to get ahead of the curve.”

“Wait a minute.” Kuroo frowned and stared accusingly at Daichi. “What about your rounds? Do you do those in November too?”

A silly tradition they shared was their open-door policy nearing the hols. It was the only time of year where everyone’s houses effectively transformed into revolving doors. Combinations were shared and spare keys passed around, and any time of day someone could be wandering into their friend’s house, sneaking a wrapped parcel underneath their mandatory Christmas tree and then prancing off into the night unseen. Oikawa was always the man to go to each year—he unofficially ran the black market for everyone’s keys and passed out individual schedules in exchange for favours, and in no small part due to his dizzying success after Boxing Day, he was always bullied into being the host for the New Year’s Eve bash at his vast, vast apartment. Or at the very least, that was the way it had been the last time you showed up, four years ago.

Daichi’s face fell blank and if he looked any more innocent, a choir of angels would feel compelled to descend in song in praise of his name. “Don’t be daft,” he said. “Where would I put your gifts in November without your trees ready?”

“He has his ways,” Ushijima offered sagely, a veteran of the magic that is Sawamura Daichi’s responsible adulting. “It’s possible he’s actually gotten all the Christmas shopping completed for the next ten years and he’s just stored them in a hidden compartment in your storage cupboards. You’d never know.”

“Stop unveiling all my secrets,” Daichi muttered, giving Ushijima’s thigh a lazy slap. “I take the Magical Statute of Secrecy very seriously, I’ll have you know.”

“No, you wouldn’t.” Musing, you rolled the image over a few times in your head. “You’d be one of those people at their boring desk jobs at the Ministry, and we’d only realize on your death bed that you’ve been secretly researching spells of mass destruction.”

Daichi reached out for a scone and bit into it with relish. “Hardly. Mass destruction is not my style.”

“Right. Serial mind-control, perhaps?” Kuroo suggested. “A drinkable Imperius?”

“I see you’ve been confusing me with Koushi.”

“Please. You know he’d offer to be a Dark Lord just for fun.”

Daichi shrugged. “He’ll suggest a Harry Potter themed Christmas one of these days, just you wait. You can tell he’s bursting at the seams for a holiday where everyone’s together and we march down the street demanding equal rights for muggle-borns and non-magical folk.”

“Do you?” Ushijima wondered aloud. “Do you think we’ll manage a Christmas where we’re all together?”

“We’d probably have to rent out Westminster cathedral to fit us all,” Kuroo grinned, clearly picturing the scene it would make—a mix of professionals, professors and national athletes all dressed up and pointing sticks at each other in robes along the antique pews. The collateral would be horrendous. They’d end up having to pay for the damage with indentured servitude.

Ushijima and Daichi smiled into their drinks, a little longing flavouring their sips. It was the warm, soft sort of longing that one reserved for wishes for happily ever afters and cosy family occasions, where they usually thought ‘this would be lovely’ and proceed to feel satisfied enough to simply imagine it. It was always better for images to replace reality; they were kind, fluttering things that diffused just enough warmth to forget the cold seeping in.

And although dreams ruined more lives than drugs have, you allowed yourself to bathe in the fleeting comfort of being surrounded by laughing, hugging people who looked at each other—and you—as if they were all the most important things in the world to each other.

“We’ll do it,” came Daichi’s voice on your left. The distant warmth faded as you raised your head to meet his eyes. His gaze pinned you down with that enveloping, unconditional kindness of his that you often wondered if it cost him a little of his soul each time he shared it with another. “Within the next five years,” he insisted, “we’ll do it. Suga will plan it all with fervent enthusiasm and we’ll get everyone together, like we’ve always wanted.”

 _Who, exactly?_  You wanted to ask, because the ‘we’ve’ seemed laden with suggestion, seemed a little to firm for it to be believable, and your chest ached at Daichi’s earnest gaze that seemed to eat through all your thoughts.

You took another sip, and although the rum was cooled by now, the burn of the alcohol still churned your insides with a shovel.

“If everyone wants to,” you said, your voice sounding far off even to yourself. Daichi’s expression darkened, and you studiously ignored it for the brick wall behind the bar.

A hand fell on your lap, squeezing at it tightly so that you couldn’t possibly pretend you weren’t the one being addressed. You wondered if Ushijima would be watching as intrigued as he had been earlier, and if Kuroo was the one pretending not to hear a word this time. No, he would be listening with that tick in his jaw and a simmering frustration that you were always the cause of.

“We’re not all going home tomorrow,” Daichi said quietly, pitched so low that only you could hear. “We’re not just here tonight because we don’t have anything better to do.”

Your voice wouldn’t come, and your cheeks burned as your heart hammered against your ribs as a lunatic does against his walls.

“I’m happy to see you tonight,” said Daichi. “I really am. We all are.”

“I come every year.”

“And?” The hand squeezed tighter, and for a moment you felt a flash of worry jolt through you—perhaps you’d managed to anger even the one person who only had indiscriminate acceptance to offer. That just perhaps this Christmas was the last where people still bothered with you. “We’re here every year too. I know you got up, changed, threw on that scarf of yours and came to have a drink with us for a reason. Why do you—still?” He took a deep, halting breath. “ _Don’t._  Just let it be.”

There were so many things you felt like you could cry into the night, that you could quite credibly protest with, but they all snuffed themselves out halfway into a thought. In the face of such devoted conviction, no matter how misplaced, anything else you wanted to say would only break Daichi’s bleeding heart, and you weren’t sure you could handle watching his face crumble with disappointment. You had enough experience in that department already that it was meaningless to hasten what would always, always come.

Was there a way to be kind even as one said ‘no, thank you,’ to someone offering their love? You considered trying it one of these days; Christmas was as good a time as any for revelations when everyone was always uncomfortably free with their kindness and tended to only retract it after the new year passed.

You nodded, and Daichi seemed to relax his grip on you after a second of study and sat back in his seat.

Everything had been signalling that this was a poor idea, but the passing years brought no wisdom to your door as you made the same mistake time and time again of indulging your impulses.

At home, nobody expected anything of you and nobody had to waste their evening throwing a pity party for a guest who seemed determined to disappear into the cracks. But as the carols outside grew bolder and the children started to shriek with joy in their little voices below your window, the longing grew stronger; the pull at your heartstrings wrapping their spindly fingers along the edge and tugging you closer and closer to the soft rug of fresh snow. The flitting visions of Kuroo cackling, Daichi’s knowing smile and Ushijima’s heart on his sleeve seemed so forgiving from far away, and with the vignette of the mind’s eye, you could almost picture yourself in the middle, as if you belonged, as if you could smile easier with people who would accompany you grin for grin.

Once, a very long time ago, you thought if you begged for something hard enough, life would take pity.

And then you grew older, and learned that your yearning was second to nobody else’s, and that life didn’t celebrate Christmas. Everyone had their sorrow; everyone suffered. You weren’t special. You would never be and had never been.

For a long time, you learned to acclimate to those rules that had revealed themselves too late. Things could be borne, aches could be weathered. You too, had bought gifts and distributed them to everyone in secret, and doing it in part gave you a little hope for some festive spirit, knowing that despite it all you’ve managed to do something for someone else, feeling alive in the spur of the moment.

But those shadowy little doubts that held bonfire dances around your demons waged war when the bells began to toll around the city. On your walks alone, you noticed tiny gift stockings beginning to dot various kids’ parks. Affection would perfume the air, and couples had their arms wound tighter around each other. Parents would come out of hibernation and send a myriad of cards to their children’s friends, and you could see the shine in the eyes of passers-by as they brainstormed all the ways they could bring joy to the ones they loved.

It was easier to convince yourself that you were faring just as well as the next person when they weren’t glowing with it.

“I know I invite you each year,” Ushijima broke the silence slowly. “But you’re still welcome at my house tomorrow. My mother’s always glad to see you.”

“Thank you,” you said, even managing to sound enthused. “But I’ve already made plans to stay at home.”

“Are you quite sure?” He leant on his elbows and held onto you with his hazel eyes. “We have our spare room fixed up for guests each Christmas.”

“I’m quite sure.” It warmed you, just ever so slightly, and your mouth curled up into a faint smile. It was comforting, even if it couldn’t possibly work out, to know that Ushijima always spoke what he meant. “It’s waking up to family that’s the best thing, after all. I’d just be too tired, besides.”

Ushijima stared for a few moments, and you were relieved when he let it go. He shrugged.

“Goshiki’s coming in the afternoon. Satori’s not too pleased about it, but it’ll work out somehow.”

“Really? Your mum’s a brave woman. Did she do the invites?”

“She always does. It’s festive, to have lots of people together, even if Satori would like as few people together as possible.” Ushijima barked out a short laugh. “He’s quite contrary for family occasions. But still, mother’s house, mother’s rules. Goshiki will be complaining how he’s not in the big city with the rest of us again.”

“Like his mother would ever let him go,” Kuroo snorted. You startled at the sudden noise, and realized he’d been silent so long that you’d almost forgotten he was sitting there. When you dared a peek at him, you felt an unfamiliar wash of relief when he looked every bit as normal as before, glorious and dangling his glass precariously between his fingers.

He caught you watching before you could look away. After a moment’s hesitation, he smiled, and dipped his head in a small apology.

There was clearly nothing he could be sorry for that you could figure, and the bafflement must have shown on your face as his face stretched into a grin and he shuffled his stool an inch closer towards you.  _Don’t worry about it,_  he mouthed, and turned to listen to Ushijima again.

“I can understand her,” Ushijima was saying, “but I can’t really empathize. Mine couldn’t wait for me to get out of the house, even if she demands me back every other weekend.”

“Kicking the eagle out of the proverbial nest,” said Daichi. “You must’ve been an overly capable youngling. Do you bring gifts and stuff with you each time you visit?”

“Of course. I’m a filial son.”

The two other men laughed, and you cracked a small grin. “That’d be why.”

“What, why she wants me gone, or why she wants me back?”

“Both,” you said, reaching out for a scone. “Mothers are fickle beings; very difficult to get a grasp on, especially during festive seasons.”

“They’re most easily observable during early evenings,” Kuroo boomed in his best David Attenborough impression, “as they flock to their kitchens with pots and pans, and their habitat is quickly overwhelmed with sounds of vigorous dicing.”

Ushijima rolled his eyes. “My mother’s terrible at cooking. She does all that stuff, but it’s my father who sneaks in and fixes everything before she can burn the house down.”

Daichi wiped an imaginary tear from his eye. “What a beautiful love story. And nobody dies, which is even better.”

“Not yet,” Ushijima said sombrely. A chunk of the weight on your chest lifted when they chuckled around you, the stickiness of liquor still dragging their voices down in a low chorus. “It’s only time, mark my words. We’ve all got the hospital on speed dial the moment someone inevitably keels over after a stray bite of pie.”

The smile remained ghosting along your lips as Kuroo said something vehement about the theory of pies and how they were literally flour bits stuffed with mystery meat that could be human for all they knew, and Daichi seemed to be nodding along happily to every single point made and throwing little inflammatory comments at the rights moments. Ushijima looked as if he was arguing for his own liberty, his eyes flashing in the dim light.

It was better when they were all smiling, laughing. It was the evening they deserved.

The barkeep wandered up towards you in the middle of their conversation. He had been keeping an eye on the four of you, even when you’d completely forgotten to keep notice as he poured drinks at the other end of the room.

He gestured at the scones, now almost all gone. “Did you enjoy those?” He asked and broke into a beam when you nodded. “Third batch, those were,” he said vehemently, “first two were little explosions on the baking tray; you should’ve seen them. I’ve got some peppermint sea-salt crumbles huffing away upstairs right now. I’ll bring ‘em over right as they’re done.”

“Thanks,” you said for the third time that evening. “I can’t wait.”

The barkeep smiled but gave you a firm looking once-over. “You look like you could do with some mint to pep you up tonight. Them three treating you alright?”

“Always,” you told him honestly, and he puffed up with satisfaction.

“If they’re giving you any trouble,” he barked before turning back to the wine rack, “just holler, and I’ll give them a quick boot up their arses.”

Without a moment to respond, he vanished past the corner and down the cellar. Daichi sipped wordlessly at his drink beside you and Kuroo rested his head on his palm as he watched the man leave.

“He’s clearly never heard of the evils of favouritism,” he muttered under his breath. “Blatant bias is what this is.”

Daichi took a particularly loud slurp. Beside him, Ushijima grinned.

“Right,” he said slowly, “and will you be informing him of them tonight?”

“Think that lowly of me, do you?” Kuroo said indignantly. “Or are you just plotting to have all the mint biscuits to yourself?”

“Hardly, considering his favouritism,” Daichi supplied, and you smiled. “You all know what miracles that man can achieve with some Himalayan sea salt.”

“How on earth is he not married? Why is he still working on Christmas eve?!”

“How should I know? Go ask him out if you’re so heated up about it all.”

Kuroo only snorted and threw up two fingers at Daichi, who received it with a blown kiss. “You’re not getting all the biscuits either.”

Ushijima blinked. “Oh, so he  _is_ learning.”

“Careful now, I’m sure he’s only feeling magnanimous during the hols,” said Daichi. “You’d better lube him up with some more drinks otherwise he’ll remember this come January and get back at you.”

“Hullo,” Kuroo said, turning to face you fully, his head wearily in his hands. “Not only am I daft, now I’m deaf too, apparently.”

Taking a drink from your own glass, you turned to face him too for the first time that evening. He looked… melancholy, despite his signature smirk, and when you weren’t required to speak, you watched him intently. He was on his third drink, which was nothing considering anyone under three found themselves painfully sober, but he often glanced at the contents as if it was withholding the secrets of the universe in its depths, and only if he could drain it all would he find it scrawled into the bottom of the thick, tinted glass.

You couldn’t remember much what he seemed like earlier, but you could swear that his sighs were lighter and his eyes a lot more generous with their creases and laughter. You wondered if it was because of you—all the bland, insensitive things you seemed to say without a filter, or the fact that you were sat next to him and your misery was contagious.

If only there was a magic to Christmas and it would make him happier, you would pour what was left of your own joy into his dwindling glass and bring it to his lips. You’d watch it disappear down his throat and he would glow softly, the edges to his hardened lips melting away with eggnog spice, and he would lean closer with a sparkle to his eye and speak to you as if he held the key to festivity.

It was what he could be. If there were other people here, if you didn’t simply sit there dumb and motionless, staring at him like a silent film in an empty cinema.

Because there wasn’t magic, and you couldn’t do a thing about it, you opened your mouth to talk instead. “Would you prefer they plotted behind your back?”

“That depends,” he said after pausing to consider it, “would you share some of the biscuits with me if they did?”

Stone cold sober you were, yet you found yourself admitting, “I’d share anything you wanted, if it meant you’d feel better.”

Kuroo started, stunned and eyes glimmering like the fairy lights behind him. You could feel your sad, lethargic heart beat a tiny bit faster from fear, the adrenaline kicking in as your dull expression froze onto your face.

“You know,” he finally said, and your hands felt so cold you’d almost lost all movement in your fingers, “I never thought you’d notice.”

You most certainly deserved it, but hearing it stung more than you anticipated. Yet oddly enough, it was exactly what you needed for your face to work again, and you smiled. It likely broke the record that evening for the most disingenuous expression in the room.

“Right.”  _Because I’ve been so pathetically self-absorbed all evening?_  “Sorry.”

“No, I meant—” he broke off, looking angrily at his hands for a moment before schooling his expression into something less vicious before looking back to you. “I thought I was not showing it as much. I thought I was better than I felt, to be honest.”

“So, it wasn’t nothing.”

“What?”

“You said not to worry about it earlier. It.”

Kuroo glanced quickly at the other two, and relaxed when he saw that they were wrapped up in another conversation entirely. “I was just thinking too much, that’s all. It still is nothing.”

It was obvious you weren’t idiotic enough to believe a word of it, but it was easier to nod and say nothing, and Kuroo seemed to accept that just as well. You watched as he traced his finger over the rim of his glass, occasionally catching a note with the condensation clung to it.

“I heard what Daichi said to you a few minutes ago.”

You let out a little sigh, unsurprised. “Which part do you mean? He said quite a bit.”

Kuroo’s lips twitched. “That he did,” he said, but turned serious again. “I mean the part about letting it go.”

“Alright. Did you want to add to it? Or do you agree?”

“Of course I agree, you daft nit.” He flicked the back of your hand irritably. “I just wish I had been able to offer something useful of my own, instead of getting in a huff.”

“Well,” you said, spreading your arms out to gesture at yourself. “Go on.”

Kuroo rolled his eyes, but there was a hint of his old smile returning. “Don’t be a twat. All I can do now is do my best to make tonight as fun for you as possible. It’s what Christmas is for, after all.” He drew in closer to you, nose pointy and eyes as cool as flint as the smile vanished. “I won’t push you into anything, but you need to know that we’ll be here for as long as you want us.”

“And you?” You countered, your chin held high and teeth ground tightly together. “Do you want to be here? How could you?”

“How could I not? C’mon,” he said, his voice cracking near the end and you watched as he, like Daichi, crumbled a little because he simply had too much love to give. It would be easier, you knew, if they learned to withhold it from the undeserving. “I just want you to smile again, that’s all. You told me you used to love Christmas as a kid.”

“I did,” you said, not bothering anymore to pretend to not be saddened by the memory. It had come out one evening when a bunch of you had camped out, semi-drunk, at Bokuto’s apartment waiting for the fireworks to start. “I think that I would have been a very different person if I had people like you to celebrate with me back then.” You laughed shortly. “But it was easy to be excited about things you’ve heard stories about when you’re five and have the memory retention of a golden retriever.”

“I’m here now. We all are. Even the barkeep and his scones.”

“I know.” You said, and pulled back from Kuroo’s earnest gaze, too weak of spirit to hold it any longer. You’d rather he glared or curse, or anything other than—than that. “I know. Kuroo, I  _know_.”

You watched his blurry shadow shrink, and you knew he had drawn back into his seat.

“I don’t want to ruin the rest of your night,” he said, voice thick. “This isn’t the time or place.”

You didn’t have the heart or energy to tell him that nights couldn’t really be ruined if they weren’t much in the first place. What a dreadful thing to be thinking—even though you’re  _happy_ that you’re out here, and people are talking to you and you’re surrounded by noise that isn’t your own fumbling about in an empty apartment, you can’t feel a single iota of it. Your pulse is still as slow as earlier, beating away at the pace of a cadaver.

Truthfully, you wouldn’t be able to recall the last time you felt happy even if someone pressed a gun to your head. Christmas was the pinnacle of not feeling miserable, and even then, it wasn’t enough. You still couldn’t prevent yourself from dragging everyone else down to your murky depths, still couldn’t bring yourself to not let everyone else down, even if you were old enough to not be berated for it.

Sometimes you still were. That voice would never leave you, shouting things and sneering and scoffing—it’d hang about the hallways whenever you felt particularly down, and it would shriek at you with words you’d memorized until you marched yourself down to the pub again, soothed by the murmuring crowd.

People didn’t like sad people. Especially ones who didn’t have a reason to be. What a failure.

“Hey,  _hey_.”

Both Daichi and Kuroo had their hands on your shoulder, shaking you gently. You looked up to see the barkeep, lips almost twisted into an upset frown, as he held a large plate of pink cookies on a porcelain plate.

“Are you alright?” He asked and turned to the guys when you seemed to be incapable of speech. “Is she alright?”

“Not at the moment,” came Ushijima’s comforting tone, “but we’ll make sure she’s better before she leaves.”

“You’d better.” The barkeep’s voice was stony. “You four finish those biscuits, understood? You’re not passing through those doors without someone laughing their way out, I swear to god.”

“We promise,” Daichi said. “They look delicious, if she’ll share some with us.”

“For fuck’s sake— _of course_  I will.” With vehemence that surprised even you, you snatched up one of those genuinely beautiful looking biscuits and stuffed it into Daichi’s mouth. To his credit, he barely blinked, and chewed on it thoughtfully.

“Just the right amount of peppermint. Is that strawberry I taste?”

“I think it’s cherry,” Kuroo said in between bites of his own. “Or, wait. Maybe you’re right.”

“It just tastes like fruit punch,” Ushijima confessed. “Kind of like a really light sangria.”

“Does your mum know you drink?” Daichi asked incredulously, “why is almost everything to do with alcohol with you?”

Ushijima shook his head, but you noticed him peeking at you in his peripheral vision. “Definitely not. I do  _not_  look like someone who drinks as a hobby.”

“Literally your only saving grace.” You brought yourself to smile faintly before he grew so concerned he toppled off his stool. “Best not to piss Satori off tomorrow in case he spills all in front of her.”

“Oh,” he answered darkly, “he doesn’t know half the things I could spill about him.”

Kuroo raised an eyebrow at that but said nothing. His hand hadn’t left your shoulder for a second, and he squeeze it gently, hooking his ankle around a leg of your chair.

“Well,” he announced, giving the massive plate of biscuits a quick shake, “we best get to work, hadn’t we?”

And get to work you all did. The tension dissolved as quickly as the sugar did in your mouths, and with enough blind determination, the chatter seemed to return again effortlessly with Ushijima’s apparent treasure mine of dark Satori-related secrets that had you laughing despite everything else. A time of sharing indeed, considering some of the things you learned that evening, and you were almost touched that he had deigned to share them with any of you.

The next time the barkeep reappeared was when he came to collect the esoteric looking plate, and this time he seemed a lot more pleased when you gave him a smile, deeming you fit enough to face the rest of the holiday without his supervision.

It was a start, if nothing else. Most of the bar had disappeared by the time the clock chimed one, and even Daichi was yawning at half past, on his fifth mug of wine, and suggested reluctantly that perhaps it was good for you all to head home before someone got into an accident from being too sloshed.

They all offered to walk you home, Ushijima almost demanding you to go home accompanied as a lone girl in the wee hours of the morning, but Daichi fended him off just in time. Kuroo was the last to leave your side, gazing up at the slow return of a light snow, and he bid you goodbye with a wave that looked almost sad in the orange lamplight.

There were very few people on the streets by then. A few clubs here and there still had pounding music shaking the grounds, but all the storefront lights had been turned off, and London looked almost like normal again, shrouded in fluorescent orange and the whistling gusts of wind about your ears.

You tucked your hands back into your pockets, now chilly after the warm pack had died an hour back, and turned to head home.


End file.
